This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Brandon Perry Smith, accused of killing a woman in December 2010, will go to trial for aggravated murder, a St. George judge has ruled.
Smith, 33, is charged in 5th District Court with aggravated murder and aggravated assault in the stabbing death of 20-year-old Jerrica Christensen. Prosecutors announced last year that they are seeking the death penalty in the case.
Smith's attorneys recently asked Judge Michael Westfall to reverse the decision to send Smith to trial for the aggravated murder, implying in court papers that Smith killed the woman because he felt threatened by his friend, Paul Clifford Ashton, who had just shot and killed one woman, and shot and wounded a man during an altercation at a St. George apartment.
After a three-day preliminary hearing in October 2013, 5th District Judge James Shumate — who has since retired — ruled that prosecutors had shown probable cause that Smith murdered Christensen. He also found that several aggravating factors justified the aggravated murder charge: that Christensen was killed during a criminal episode in which two or more people were killed, that the homicide was committed incident to attempted kidnapping, that Christensen was killed to prevent her from testifying and that the homicide was committed in an "especially heinous, atrocious, cruel or exceptionally depraved manner."
Defense Attorney Gary Pendleton argued this decision should be reversed because there was no evidence presented by prosecutors that supported the aggravating factors. He argued in court papers that prosecutors failed to show that Smith planned the killings with Ashton, that Smith had any intention of kidnapping Christensen, that Christensen was killed to keep her from testifying or that Smith tortured or caused unnecessary suffering to the woman.
Because prosecutors did not prove these aggravating factors, Pendleton argued, his client should not go to trial for aggravated murder and should not face the death penalty.
In his ruling filed last week, Westfall disagreed, saying that there was evidence presented to support each of the aggravating factors. While there may be some question about Smith's state of mind that night — defense attorneys say he felt his own life was threatened, while prosecutors argued that Smith is cold-hearted and relished taking the life of a stranger — the judge ruled that those issues should be left for a jury to decide.
The motion to quash the preliminary hearing bindover — first filed in November 2013 — has stalled the case for over a year, as attorneys waited for transcripts, oral arguments and, finally, a judge's decision. No trial date has been set, and no new court dates had been scheduled for Smith as of Tuesday.
Pendleton wrote in court papers that Smith went to Ashton's St. George apartment on Dec. 11, 2010, after Ashton had texted him, asking for a gun and saying he needed to "defend himself."
Smith came to the apartment with two guns, but Pendleton wrote that it quickly became apparent to his client that Ashton was not in any grave danger. Three people — Christensen, Brandie Sue Dawn Jerden and James Fiske — were at the apartment moving Jerden and Fiske's things out, but there was no "real tension" between the parties, according to the defense motion.
At some point, Jerden confronted Ashton — who was seated in an electric wheelchair because of an accident that injured his leg — about a missing mountain bike. Jerden struck Ashton in the face with a plastic clamshell toolbox, according to the defense motion, and, at that point, Smith pulled out a gun he was carrying. Ashton pulled out a gun, as well.
"Ashton simultaneously produced the firearm [Smith] had given him and shot Brandie Jerden in the face," Pendleton wrote. "She was apparently killed instantly."
Ashton then shot at Fiske, a bullet hitting him in the right shoulder. Fiske testified during the preliminary hearing that before he fled the apartment, he heard Ashton order Smith to "go get the other one," in reference to Christensen.
Smith later told police that Christensen had locked herself in the bathroom after the shooting. He kicked in the door, he told a detective, while Ashton yelled at him to "get her" and "do it."
"Smith had just witnessed Ashton shoot two individuals," Pendleton wrote. "Ashton was no longer in the wheelchair talking to Smith. He was on his feet halfway back to the bedroom holding the firearm he had just used on Jerden and Fiske, shouting directives at Smith."
Smith allegedly admitted to police that after he beat Christensen with the socket wrench handle, he tried to choke her, and ultimately cut her throat with his pocketknife, according to attorneys.
He had never met Christensen before that day, according to prosecutors.
Ashton — who also had faced the possibility of the death penalty — is serving two life sentences in federal prison after he pleaded guilty in the apartment killings, and also admitted to kidnapping and aiding in the murder of a homeless man, also in October 2010.
Twitter: @jm_miller